A Rousing Defense of the Oft Maligned Disobedience
by lionesseyes13
Summary: When Neal is assigned to write a punishment essay on disobedience for Lord Wyldon, this is what results. Written for the January Challenge at TPE.
1. Chapter 1

**By: **Nealan (Neal) of Queenscove, who, of course, refers to himself in the first person throughout this essay.

**Submitted to: **Lord Wyldon of Cavall, the most feared training master in the history of civilization. (No hyperbole intended.)

**At: **A moment before the eleventh hour as commanded in order to avoid writing another essay twice as long as the one following the proper report heading.

**Essay Topic: **Disobedience in case it slipped my lordship's mind, because my enlightened training master has obviously never heard of a valuable and mysterious reference tool that most scholars refer to as a dictionary, and so is unaware of the distinction between "insolence" and "disobedience." However, any magistrate judging my case should be aware that I was guilty of insolence, not of disobedience as my lordship claims.

**Essay Title: "**A Rousing Defense of the Oft-Maligned Disobedience" (guaranteed to be, if the free-speech-loving Lord Wyldon doesn't rip it to shreds before anyone else can read it, among the best-loved essays in jails and other vice dens).

**Body of Essay (I bet you thought it would never come, but you see I proved you wrong. You should also be aware that the heading counts toward the word count of this essay. Therefore, I have dragged it out as long as I possibly could without making it blatantly obvious to even the most inbred of nobles what I was doing. If a university education taught me anything, it was how to use a lot of words to say nothing at all.) **: Disobedience is a concept that has often been condemned by those who do not truly comprehend it. Parents are always scolding their children for it. Teachers are forever punishing their pupils for it, even while they declare that they are encouraging intellectual development and fostering independent thought in their students. Military commanders are always insisting that whole legions of soldiers perish on the battlefield because of it. Religious authorities are always lamenting the fact that a vast majority of humanity will be sentenced to eternal suffering (here the word "eternal" does not actually mean "endless," but rather something along the lines of "not before the person suffering was even conceived and not during the person's time in the Mortal Realms, since most scholars believe that the Mortal Realms aren't supposed to be a punishment by the gods per say") for their rebellious tendencies, which are, you will remember through the confusing knot of clauses I created, the real topic of this paper. Kings are always chopping their subjects' heads of for the mere thought of defiance.

Given the fact that just about every legitimate authority, as described in the lengthy above paragraph, frowns upon disobedience (and a cynic would ask why wouldn't they when it is in their own best interests that everyone obey them unquestioningly?), one may very well be tempted to conclude that defiance is a human depravity that should be stamped out as rapidly as possible.

However, a wise person (who would often take the form of the cynic I mentioned in the parenthesis of the previous paragraph) would consider looking at what our great writers and philosophers have said on the subject of disobedience. Unsurprisingly, given that "eccentric" is often the most charitable term employed to describe such intellectual giants, most of these writers and philosophers have come down in the favor of disobedience. According to these brilliant men, humans actually have a right to have independent thoughts and to act according to these ideas as their conscience dictates.

In this essay, while I polish swords in the armory for the third bell in a row, which is a thoroughly stimulating task for someone of my intellectual caliber, I wish to add my voice to the chorus of those defending the oft-maligned virtue of disobedience.

Not having the brains of a squash, I recognize that the intended audience of this treatise, my esteemed Lord Wyldon of Cavall, will not approve of this thesis. Indeed, I am aware that when he assigned me this essay, he hoped that I would end up declaring that disobedience is a characteristic unbefitting of a knight or even one in training. No doubt, he would have liked me to make reference to the fact that he has often said that disobedience can get a knight and anyone serving with that knight killed (and there, as more astute readers will observe, I have made just such a mention). Perhaps he would have even been able to overcome his loathing of me enough to feel a momentary surge of approval for me if I had managed to work into my paper a clever (if not so original) assertion that a knight should obey every order he receives, because by some cruel twist of fate, it could turn out that the order he chose to defy would be the one that was intended to save his neck. Unfortunately for Lord Wyldon, I refuse to write an essay arguing that the best knights are those who obey orders blindly.

After all, this is an essay, and essays were devised during the Thanic Empire as a literary venue by which one could express one's thoughts on a particular subject. Therefore, when Lord Wyldon of Cavall commanded me to write this essay on disobedience, he was asking for my thoughts upon that subject. Although, since he despises just about every bright idea that my genius has ever concocted, I cannot be certain why he has asked me to share the thoughts he so detests with him. The most solid conclusion that I can arrive at is that he has assigned this paper to me as a more refined means of torture than the ones he typically engages in when training pages. However, if that is indeed the case, it might do his lordship well to contemplate the fact that I received academic honors every semester that I was enrolled in the university. As such, reading my essay will probably be more of a punishment for him than writing it is for me. Maybe when his lordship finally procures a dictionary, he will be able to look up "irony," as well as "disobedience" and "insolence."

Anyway, since an essay is a literary venue by which one expresses one's opinion of a particular subject, I decided that I should be nothing less than honest about my opinion. Therefore, I can only hope that Lord Wyldon, who believes that the Code of Chivalry is more than a collection of ought-to suggestions, will respect me for my honesty even if he wants to disembowel me for everything else.

As I am currently in the business of being as frank as possible, I wish to state that it is my personal opinion that the realm's most valuable knights are those who are capable of independent thought and who appreciate the importance of taking initiative. After all, as my vaunted grandfather Emry of Haryse has explained to me more times than even the most talented mathematicians could count, once a battle starts, everything goes wrong, and, thus, the most valuable warriors are those who can think on their feet. People who can think on their feet are the sort of individuals who can weed good orders from stupid ones, thereby saving not only their own necks but also the lives of those alongside them who may not have the courage to defy a dumb command otherwise or who might lack the intelligence necessary to spot a foolish order for what it is. Furthermore, it is the people who can think on their feet who are able to recognize when an old tactic isn't working and who will take responsibility for creating a new, effective one, even if they are disobeying orders by doing so. Therefore, it is clear that it is the disobedient warrior, rather than the blindly obedient one, who wins battles and wars for Tortall.

This, of course, is a bold declaration. As such, it is undeniably a supposition that requires some evidence to back it up. That being established, I will draw on three examples to support my thesis, because I have been taught at the university that three is the magic number of examples that all essays should have, since one example could be nothing more than a random occurrence, two examples could be ascribed to nothing more than mere coincidence, and more than three examples would make a very dull reading experience.

The first example I wish to discuss is Lysander of Blue Harbor and his famous actions in the Battle of Bloody Spear during the Bazhir Wars in the reign of King Jasson, who perhaps is most famous today for the number of statues commemorating him in Corus. Now, during the Battle of Bloody Spear, Lysander of Blue Harbor received orders from his commanding officer (who most military historians now believe liked to make all of his command decisions while intoxicated) to fight the Bazhir in the usual method. Essentially, this method entailed refusing to acknowledge that the Bazhir fought differently than most armies in the Eastern Lands, and, thus getting slaughtered because tactics that worked spectacularly against other peoples did not work well against the Bazhir. At the Battle of Bloody Spear, Lysander finally got tired of seeing his soldiers massacred because of foolish orders issued by his commanding officer. It was then that he came up with the novel concept of using the Bazhir tactics against the tribesmen. By doing so, he transformed the Battle of Bloody Spear from an ignominious Tortallan defeat to a glorious Tortallan victory. In the process, he helped conquer the Southern Desert for Tortall, and, although his commanding officer tried to have him executed for his disobedience, he ended up being promoted to supreme commander of the desert operations of the Bazhir War, while his previous commanding officer was relieved of command. Therefore, in the case of Lysander of Blue Harbor, his defiance not only saved himself and his men, but also provided a tremendous boon to his realm for which he is justly remembered by teachers who struggle valiantly to cram boring historical information into the thick heads of their students.

The second example that I wish to examine transpired during the war with Tusaine during King Roald's reign. As anyone with even a smattering of history knowledge is well aware, during this war, the squire to Prince Jonathan (who is, of course, married to the woman who is generally classified as the most beautiful woman in the world and is also the present king responsible for many reforms that make the average conservative simply apoplectic with rage) happened to be kidnapped. King Roald issued orders that nobody was to cross into Tusaine in an attempt to rescue the prince's kidnapped squire. However, Prince Jonathan was devoted to his squire, and, so, with several knights (and their loyal squires), he snuck across the border to Tusaine. After a very brief battle, Prince Jonathan and his companions were able not only to rescue the prince's squire, but were also able to capture the King of Tusaine's brothers. With his brothers hostage, the King of Tusaine was easily convinced to surrender upon terms that were highly favorable to Tortall. Thus, by defying orders and taking initiative, Prince Jonathan and his valiant accomplices were able to end the war with Tusaine more quickly than if they had obeyed orders, not only sparing the Tortallan lives that would have been lost had the bloodshed continued, but also securing that the peace terms agreed upon were very much in favor of the Tortallans.

Finally, I would like to examine a case of admirable disobedience during the recent conflict that has come to be referred to as the Immortals War. During the Immortals War, one of the many places in the realm that was attacked was the Royal Palace itself. When the Royal Palace itself was attacked, Lord Wyldon of Cavall received very specific orders that he was to remain upon the ramparts during the battle. However, when the noble Lord Wyldon spotted hurrocks invading the royal nursery, he did not hesitate to abandon his post to rescue the younger royal children. In doing so, he showed his understanding of just how valuable those children were to the country and a comprehension of the fluid nature of warfare situations. That is, he understood that the orders from his superiors would have been very different if his superiors had foreseen the attack upon the royal nursery, and he acted according to that knowledge. The king and queen, far from being furious at Lord Wyldon for disobeying his orders, were grateful to him for saving their regal offspring, although the Lord of Cavall resolutely maintained that he did not require any reward from the Crown for his heroism. Apparently, he regarded the scars he received and the loss of the use of one arm for a year as a prize enough, as any truly humble knight would.

In conclusion, based on all these instances of a well-timed act of disobedience saving lives and benefiting all of Tortall, I would suggest that defiance is, actually a virtue, not a crime. Moreover, I would encourage everyone to develop the independent streak and the sense of initiative that it requires to not blindly accept orders that will only result in death and destruction. I would also urge readers to remember that the ability to think on one's toes that is so characteristic of disobedience is a very important quality for a warrior to possess as soon as a battle starts and all the best laid plans of generals begin to go awry. In short, I suggest that would-be knights emulate the acts of disobedience that I outlined, assuming, of course, that they can overcome the rebellious tendencies which would prevent them from following anyone…


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Note: Originally, this fanfiction was planned as a oneshot. However, due to the numerous requests for a sequel describing Lord Wyldon's reaction to Neal's impertinent essay, I chose to write another chapter. I tried to capture the humor blended with seriousness and the complexity of the relationship that exists between Wyldon and Neal that readers seemed to enjoy so much in Neal's essay. Unfortunately, I don't know if I succeeded as much as I would have liked, but I hope that readers will still enjoy my humble efforts here.

Consequences for a Rousing Defense of the Oft-Maligned Disobedience

A sharp knock on the door to his study dragged Lord Wyldon of Cavall out of his vivid contemplation of plunging a lance through Nealan of Queenscove's lungs so that the insolent boy wouldn't have enough hot air to offer his constant insulting commentary or at the very least cutting out the lad's impertinent tongue. It didn't matter that his right arm was still in a sling yet from when the hurrock had ravaged it in the royal nursery. He was knight enough that he wasn't crippled by the temporary loss of his dominant arm.

"Enter," he ordered tersely and wasn't astonished when Nealan of Queenscove strode into his office. After all, he had commanded his most aggravating page to come to his study at this hour. As was to be expected, Queenscove had elected to test his temper by arriving at the moment before the eleventh hour just to leave Wyldon speculating on whether Queenscove would actually possess the gumption it required to ignore a meeting with the training master.

"Your lordship wished to see me," remarked Queenscove after shutting the door to Lord Wyldon's study, offering an exaggerated obeisance.

"No, Queensove," Wyldon corrected crisply. "Plainly, it was you who wished to see me, since you were the one who made this meeting necessary."

"The incredible leaps of your lordship's logic have left my silly mind in the dust, I'm afraid." Queenscove's green eyes widened innocently, and Lord Wyldon scowled, since, in his extensive experience with Page Nealan, he had learned that the boy in question only dropped his know-it-all attitude if he thought he could trap others with feigned stupidity.

"Then I shall explain myself to you." Wyldon opened a drawer, withdrew a piece of parchment that he was eagerly anticipating the incineration of, and slammed Page Nealan's defiant essay on the merits, rather than the drawbacks, of disobedience onto his desk. "This is the reason you are here. Now, why don't you tell me what this is?"

"It appears to be parchment with words written in ink upon it, my lord," replied Queenscove, barely glancing at the offensive essay. "Of course, appearances can be deceptive, as you no doubt understand after your years on the battlefield. I would, naturally, want to perform in-depth analysis of the parchment and the ink in question before I reached a definite conclusion."

"I'll save you the trouble, Queenscove." Lord Wyldon's glower deepened, and he wondered if Duke Baird would appreciate it if he slapped some sense into his son. Probably not, he decided. Duke Baird was a healer to the core, always yammering on about broken bones and brain damage. This intense concern with brain damage most likely was the reason why sense had not been slapped into Page Nealan earlier. "I assure you that this is, in fact, the essay on disobedience that you submitted to me."

"If you received my essay, I don't know why your lordship summoned me," observed Queenscove, arching his eyebrows. "I turned in an essay on disobedience just as your lordship requested."

"You turned in an essay on the scant benefits, rather than the manifold problems, associated with disobedience," Lord Wyldon snapped, his cheeks flushing with ire.

"Your lordship assigned me to write an essay on the subject of disobedience." Queenscove's emerald eyes danced in a manner that established more eloquently than words ever could that he found nothing more pleasurable than taunting his training master. "If your lordship had wished me to write on the narrower topic of the pitfalls of disobedience rather than just the broad subject of disobedience, your lordship should have defined the topic of the essay with more specificity. Given your lordship's devotion to justice, you will comprehend how unfair it is to blame the student for the shortcomings and lack of clarity of the teacher."

"Very well," Lord Wyldon answered frigidly, noting inwardly that if Page Nealan played with fire, he would get scorched a consequence. Taking satisfaction from the notion that Queensove, who thought he was so clever, was about to realize how foolish he really was, the training master went on in a tone cold enough to freeze blood, "Let's examine some of the flaws in your essay that you cannot blame on your instructors. Your first mistake, Queenscove, was a grammatical one. When you state, 'Although, since he despises just about every bright idea that my genius has ever concocted, I cannot be certain why he has asked me to share the thoughts he so detests with him,' you, in your haste to impugn my intelligence, were guilty of a fragment. Next time you wish to call into question the erudition of others, you should ensure that your grammar is impeccable first. Hypocrisy has the horrible tendency of undermining one's own arguments."

"Your words of wisdom, as ever, will be remembered well into my senility, I assure you, sir." Once again, Queenscove bowed mockingly. "Are there any other legitimate grievances that your lordship has with my treatise?"

"Yes," responded Lord Wyldon, his lips pressing together tightly. "During your discussion of the war with Tusaine, you mistakenly assert that the then Prince Jonathan and his companions captured the brothers of the king of Tusaine. In reality, they only captured one of the king's brothers."

"You are nitpicking." Queenscove crossed his arms over his chest. "How many brothers were captured has no relevance to the overall nature of my argument. The main point made was not undermined by the fact that only one brother, instead of two, was captured."

"The credibility of your argument was lessened by your error," countered Lord Wyldon, glad that he could at least rip some of Page Nealan's essay to shreds. Maybe this humiliation would be enough to push the headstrong lad back to the university where he belonged. After all, while Queenscove wasn't clumsy in yard skills, he had the spirit of a healer, not a knight. When it came down to it, the boy would rather tend to the wounded than fight. Moreover, he had the soul of a scholar rather than a soldier. In the final analysis, he preferred questioning superiors to obeying them. The university, not knighthood training, was where Queenscove's innate potential—which even Lord Wyldon would grant that the insubordinate young man had—would be developed so that he could serve the realm to the best of his abilities. "If people cannot trust you in minor details, they cannot rely on you in major ones, either. Common sense dictates as much. Besides, if you ever want anyone to take your battlefield analysis seriously, you need to ensure that your details are correct. Details have been the death of many knights."

"I can only assume that you, sir, are attacking the details rather than the overarching theme of my essay because, if you assailed my premise, you would be arguing with yourself," Queenscove commented, all airiness.

"You will not disrespect me again by mocking my decision to rescue the royal children for a second time," warned Lord Wyldon, a quiet menace pervading his voice and his brown eyes burning. "That you dared to do so in your essay to me was bad enough."

"Mock your choice to save the royal children?" His forehead knotting, Queenscove cocked his head. "Your lordship misconstrued my tone twice. I admire your decision to rescue the royal children. You and I often disagree on every conceivable subject, but when it comes to your choice to save the royal children, we are in complete agreement. Even though I think you should cooperate with the healers more about the injury to your arm and that accepting the reward the Crown offered you for your valiant service to Tortall would not have been amiss on your part, I will not deny that when you raced into the royal nursery you were a true hero. I will never stop disrespecting you, my lord, but rest assured that when anyone asks me, I always say with absolute sincerity that your lordship is never anything less than brave."

"Flattery will not protect you from my wrath." Suspicious that Page Nealan was lying or taunting him, Lord Wyldon's eyes narrowed dangerously. "I trust that you wouldn't be dishonest in an attempt to decrease the punishment that you undoubtedly will receive for your insulting essay."

"Sir, you know that I never lie to appease you," snorted Queenscove. "That's why I had to write the essay that angered you in the first place."

"Well, in that case, you should be aware that it is only in very rare circumstances that disobedience is justified, and that, even when the defiance is justified, there will always be a price exacted for it," Wyldon informed him dryly, glancing at the arm wrapped in its sling. "Every action has a consequence, and the one for the defiance that you exhibited in your essay for me will be a bell's worth of time spent in the armory polishing swords every Sunday until you return home for the summer. You can use that time to reflect on whether the essay you wrote for me was truly worth the time and energy it will cost you. You might also contemplate how much better your life would be if you returned to the university to train to be a healer."

"I will not change my mind about being a knight, my lord," declared Queenscove shortly, and a haunted expression dominated his features for a moment. "I will be a knight of the realm since my brothers are no longer around to do so."

Recalling the bloody deaths of Graeme and Emry of Queenscove that he had heard whispered of too many times, Wyldon wondered whether Nealan would be another casualty to the Immortal Wars who just took a longer time to perish even as he pointed out dispassionately, "Knights are not the only people who serve the country. Healers, scholars, and peasants are all, in their own ways, just as vital to the well-being of the kingdom."

"I want to be a knight," Queenscove insisted, his hands balling into fists.

"Sometimes duty requires that we relinquish our selfish desires and resist the temptation to structure our lives around what we, personally, want," Lord Wyldon said, although he knew that Queenscove, whose mind was as closed as an iron trap far too often, wouldn't listen.

"I want to be a knight because a member of the Queenscove house has served the Crown faithfully as a knight for generations," Queenscove snarled. "You are a conservative, my lord, so you must understand why I would not wish to break such a chain. Since you love the past so much, you must comprehend why I will not ignore the silent ancestors who are always hovering over my shoulder. My decision has nothing to do with _me_, and everything to do with _them_."

"I knew you wouldn't listen to me." Feeling abruptly exhausted, Lord Wyldon sighed and waved a hand in dismissal. "Go away before your tongue can land you in any more trouble."

"May the sagacity your lordship is renowned for increase tenfold overnight." With a final parody of a bow, Queenscove left Lord Wyldon's study, closing the door in his wake.

In the quiet that filled the room now that Queenscove and his impertinence had departed at last, Lord Wyldon found himself staring down at the rousing defense of the oft-maligned disobedience that Queenscove had possessed the temerity to submit to him. Earlier, he had been planning on watching the parchment be devoured by flames in the fireplace of his bedchamber until only cinders remained, but now he wanted to keep the essay. If Nealan was slain in battle like Graeme and Emry had been, he wished to have a momento of the boy, and the young man's arrogance and insolence was perfectly captured in the essay.

Why exactly he would wish to remember someone who frequently made him think about the merits of executing one's pupils was a mystery, he thought as he placed the essay in his desk drawer. Perhaps, because he understood that death tended to turn everybody into paragons of virtue, he wanted to ensure that he recalled just how many faults Nealan of Queenscove had.


End file.
